Tag Archives: belief

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Balloons, Sharp Sticks, and Being Right

Yesterday, I not only had the opportunity to substitute teach a Sunday morning Bible study class, but I also made it back out to the church for an afternoon class on Baptist history. Strange the things you can take away from such humdrum church activities without even knowing it. Despite neither lesson focusing on it, I was left pondering how important it is to some Christians that they be proven right. Do you know what I mean?

Like a lot of things, this is not an exclusively Christian mindset. Religions of all brands and breeds contain their fair share of accuracy wardens, as do atheists and the non-religious philosophers of our day. There are agnostics even who hope their hesitation stems from loyalty to logic rather than complete disregard for it. We want to ensure that our belief system is error-free and precise in all circumstances. Because, if it’s not … if some sharp stick of dissent can easily be poked through the ideological membrane of our system … well, let’s just say we tend to react a lot more like the kid whose balloon has just been popped than the adult whose matured enough to learn that balloons are known to pop from time to time and it’s not the end of the world as we know it, nor the end of balloons as we know it.

"C'mon, Timmy, just let it go. We'll get you another one. They only cost a quarter."

Now, before you assume I’m nitpicking guardianship, I want to be clear I’m not calling out people who simply desire veracity in their beliefs. Who doesn’t? I certainly want the tenets of my faith to hold true. That’s why I believe them, actually – because despite the sticks of criticism that poke at my faith from time to time, I have found that what I believe has never really been popped. Punctured, maybe, but I’m okay with a patchwork faith. The things I believe may come across frowsy, but not as flimsy or fragile as balloons.

I’m talking about the folks who feel an overprotective need to verify not only what they believe, but to grind to mulch any and every stick that might be picked up by a critic. Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about.

In the Baptist History class last night (yeah, I know, I already took an actual semester-long class on Baptist history in seminary, but like any exhausted grad student, I nodded off a couple times, so it doesn’t hurt to have a refresher), we learned about J.R. Graves , the gentleman to whom Landmarkism is attributed - Landmarkism being an absurd (if you’re a supporter of scholarship or even plain,old-fashioned logic) belief in Baptist history that the only true, valid church is a Baptist church, as long as it, of course, adheres to Landmark beliefs, and that Baptists can trace their roots back all the way to John the Baptist.

It's in his name, for crying out loud!

If you grew up Baptist (especially in the South or Midwest), or if you have some familiarity with Baptist practices, you may have encountered the lingering effects of this 19th century controversy when you were told that Catholics are bound for hell, and those Episcopals, Presbyterians and Methodists aren’t far behind. I grew up suspicious of other denominations and it wasn’t until I graduated college and actually started spending time with some young, devout Catholic students that I realized the faultiness of this way of thinking.

The question, of course, is why J.R. Graves would ever feel the need to be so extreme with his rewrite of Baptist history. It’s one thing to take pride in your denominational tradition – it’s quite another to condemn everyone else. I don’t mean to copy Graves’s extremism by offering this analogy, but it stands to reason that if Adolf Hitler had settled for being merely proud of the Aryan race and stopped there, millions of families might not have been destroyed. Sure, people might have thought the little guy with the Charlie Chaplin mustache was a teensy bit racist, but simple pride in one’s race does not a genocidal maniac make. The same thing goes for diehard fans of believer’s baptism.

Though, I'll admit, he's got the mug for it.

It’s when we seek to purify our beliefs to such an extent that we reject any notion of misguidedness or fallacy that we wind up losing touch with the very point of our faith. When a Christian – like J.R. Graves – insists on factual treatment of faith, he becomes his own worse fear. He becomes a contradiction. A person’s faith cannot be based on facts. If it is, it isn’t faith at all, but merely an obsession with proof. When Graves sought to “purify” the Baptist legacy by adding erroneous assumptions about history, as well as severing all lines of participation and mutual respect with other denominations, he was entering into one of the most dangerous forms of escapism that there is.

We may not think we’re as bad as Graves when it comes to arguing for the truth, but as my pastor commented last night, it seems the man’s quest for purity boiled down to that age-old vice known as arrogance; “There’s something about having that secret knowledge that nobody else does,” the pastor reminded us, and he was right. We love to be in-the-know, and, for some twisted reason, being in-the-know feels a lot more exciting if we can look out our stained-glass windows and see all the people who don’t have the same clue.

"Look at those chumps out there, walking around all ignorant and indigo."

In addition to the tenets of my faith, I also believe in something I like to call the Great Conversation. It’s a conversation that all of us can be a part of if we wish, whether we are Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, atheists or whatever way we choose to categorize ourselves. I enter into the Great Conversation when I choose not to build a moat between myself and the rest of the world. When I trust in the strength of my ideological membrane not because it can’t be punctured, but because the only way I will learn how to strengthen it is by accepting that the occasional stick might pierce a weak spot. To be a part of the Great Conversation, we do not have to become relativistic or unitarian (even though all relativists and Unitarians are welcome to join in) – we can hold fast to what we believe. I know our pluralist society praises compromise, but most religious people would agree that there are some aspects of one’s faith that cannot be compromised. However, this doesn’t mean the conversation shouldn’t continue. Sometimes the best discussion that occurs in this Conversation concerns the reasons why some beliefs cannot be compromised. This is how we learn from one another.

No one will ever listen to what you have to say if they don’t think you respect them, or if you show no patience with them, or if you exude suspicion rather than attentiveness. If you find yourself feeling this way, you may have already started backpedaling, stumbling into the trap of escapism into which Graves fell.

As for me, I think it’s high time we lay down our sticks and have a chat.

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7 Misconceptions about Christianity – Part Two

With the three major ones covered in my previous post, it’s time to move on to four more widely held misconceptions about what Christianity, and, by extension, living life as a Christian in America, is all about.

#4 – “Christian” is an Adjective

I’m not so sure my argument is going to hold up against the vast array of examples commonly spoken and written today, but here goes. What is most important to remember here is that while the word “Christian” may indeed come with a connotative sidecar in which it can be a modifier, the word originated as a noun. Today, if you were to look up “Christian” in a dictionary, you’re likely to see it listed as an adjective, too, but dictionaries today are also letting in verbs like “tweet” and “text,” and gerunds like “facebooking,” so it’s important to take what Webster says with a grain of salt.

You're just riding Arnold's coattails, kid.

Okay, so, what exactly is the misconception?

It is not so much that the word “Christian” is being misused so much as the original spirit of the word has been forgotten. The New Testament contains the story of the word’s inception; interestingly enough, it wasn’t invented by Jesus or by Peter or any of the other disciples, and it didn’t come out of Jerusalem or Rome. According to the eleventh chapter of Acts, as well as other historical sources, the term was applied to the “believers” living in Antioch, a city in North Africa. Most scholars indicate that the term was meant to be derogatory; essentially, it means “little Christs.” Indeed, a close reading of Acts 11 reveals that something very interesting was going on in that community: believing Jews had begun telling Greeks (often referred to in the New Testament as Gentiles) about Jesus Christ, and they had in turn become devoted followers. This local movement gained such strength that word reached the apostles in Jerusalem, and they sent to Antioch two of their most revered teachers, Barnabas and the recently converted Saul of Tarsus. These two ended up living with the Hellenist believers and teaching them for an entire year. Acts 11 claims “a great many people” were taught, so much so that the rest of the people of Antioch took notice and began calling this odd Jewish/Hellenist hybrid sect “Christians” because they found it absurd that the worship of this Christ figure had transformed the believers entire lives.

So, again, what is the misconception?

Simply the fact that these days the word “Christian” refers to a person who goes to church, or who lives a somewhat noticeable moral life, or is honest or polite or hails from Mississippi.

This makes my eyes bleed.

Do you see what I’m getting at? These days, we use the word more as a descriptor of behavior and/or religious affiliation than we do as the moniker for someone who is living a dynamically counter-cultural life – someone who has released his or her grip on the status quo and chosen to submit themselves completely to God and the salvation made available by the sacrifice of Christ. Sadly, there aren’t a lot of true Christians turning heads today. No wonder such a drastic yet wonderfully descriptive label has lost all of its intrigue and effect.

#5 – You Don’t Have to Believe in Miracles to Be a Christian

Sorry, but you do. There’s really no getting around this one, despite what some people who you may have run across believe. There’s something going around in postmodern America today that, at first glance, seems healthy, but has turned out to be nothing but self-actualizing fluff for most people. That is the abiding interest in developing a personal spirituality based on a hodgepodge of various religious ideologies down through the centuries.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I enjoy living in a pluralist society. I embrace the diversity of America and the freedom of people to adhere to the religion they choose. Religion should never be forced on anyone, young or old. It is the acceptance of  the existence of an ordered and purposeful reality beyond ourselves. To be meaningful at all, it must be freely chosen. However, the drawback to living in a pluralist society is that many people have come to believe that these religions can be gathered together as if in a buffet, and that you can stroll along filling your plate with whatever looks good while leaving behind the less-tantalizing aspects of these faiths. If you’re jonesing for a little mysticism to garnish your rationalism and scientific method, no problem. You take all the contemplative prayer or creative meditation you need to keep you feeling connected to a Higher Power.

"Ooh, it says here the Vedic Thought is free-range and grass-fed!"

The first thing many people are willing to leave out of Christianity is the miracle component. These are the same people who are quick to call Jesus a “great moral teacher” (sometimes, they might even label him a “prophet”) but will make that squinchy, well-I-wouldn’t-go-that-far face when you press them on whether or not he was the actual son of God, or if he actually rose from the dead. You see, a man who was fully divine while being fully human isn’t physically or empirically possible. Neither is resurrection from the dead. When it comes to these things, as well as all the miraculous works in both the New Testament and the Old, Christianity starts to weigh down the buffet plate. Accept all this, and suddenly your personal spirituality appears exclusive – it becomes its own meal – and requires a greater committment than people are willing to give to it.

If “Christian” means what it has come to mean today, I suppose you can go ahead and continue believing this misconception. However, if it means what it actually originally meant, then miracles can’t be left off the plate. They’re like vegetables – sometimes they’re hard to swallow, but they turn out to be what gives you the most strength.

"No offense, rabbi, but is the bread whole grain? Levi is on Adkins."

#6 – Christianity Helps You Achieve Success and Prosperity

It is extremely frustrating for a humble Christian dedicated to daily self-denial and sacrificial love that the most well-known and listened-to spokespersons for Christianity are those pearly toothed slick suits preaching to five-digit congregations every week while being broadcast all over the world. But even that wouldn’t be so bad if their message was true, if they were providing accurate, evenhanded exposition of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The problem is that most of them don’t even come close to what the real truth of Christianity is. But why not? Do all these preachers really think that this whole “health and wealth” interpretation of Christianity is actually correct? Is Joel Osteen serious?

Here he is preaching or teaching his audience how to deliver a double knuckle sandwich.

I can’t really answer this. What I do know is that the gospel of Jesus Christ, as far as I understand it, outlines a lifestyle that is not nearly as attractive and desirable as what the majority of these televangelists are offering. Jesus himself saw most of his followers abandon him because of how tough his teaching became; at the very end, only a couple of women watched him gasp his final breaths. So, either these televangelists are better sales persons of the gospel than the actual Savior is, or somewhere the message has gotten off track.

This is not to say that all mega-churches are nothing but factories manufacturing lies. When you come to truly accept the gospel of Christ, you find it to be something infinitely more compelling than anything you’ve ever encountered, and you are all for joining with other believers to worship and pray and study together. The one thing you don’t do, however, is put this gospel to work for you as if it were some sort of investment incentive or financial benefits plan. Jesus is recorded as saying several different times something to the tune of, “I tell you the truth, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name” (see John 14-16). The difference between the Christians who commit themselves to justice, live mercifully, and walk humbly with God and the “Christian” televangelists who tell you that God is all about getting you that promotion or raise or new house or nicer car is … well … I think it’s obvious, don’t you?

#7 – America was Founded as a Christian Nation

There’s that adjectival use of “Christian” again. Uh oh.

If you’ve ever visited Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson, you may have learned about a famous copy of the Bible known as the Jefferson Bible, the text of which is freely available online. The story goes that Thomas Jefferson, one of the most revered of America’s founding fathers, appreciated all the moral teachings of Jesus, but, like the type of people mentioned earlier in this post, was not ready to accept the miraculous side to him. He was a fan of the human Jesus, but Jesus the deity was too much of a stretch and, according to Jefferson, nothing but a way for priests to get rich. So, Jefferson took a razor blade and cut out all the passages in the gospels that contained miraculous events, and then pasted the rest together to provide a chronological account of Jesus, that great, sane moral teacher (who we’ll try to forget referred to himself as divine).

He also owned a copy of The Lord of the Rings with all those annoying elves and orcs cut out.

While some of the people who were a part of our country’s inception indeed professed an unwavering adherence to the doctrines of Christianity, the majority of our founding fathers – including some of the most well-known like Ben Franklin, James Madison, John Adams, and Jefferson – were deists. If they believed in a Higher Power at all, it was in God as merely the Creator, with the business of redemption left to the devices of humanity. It’s hard to blame them, really. They were products of the Age of Enlightenment, a time when the Western world saw scientific study grow by leaps and bounds, when France overthrew its government and bowed to the Goddess of Reason, and that great patriot Thomas “These are the times that try men’s souls” Paine could also pen lines like “My own mind is my own church.” Hence, science and reason became the keys to salvation, rather than submission, confession and repentance.

There’s a difference between founding a nation of Judeo-Christian principles, and founding it on the Judeo-Christian religion. Thus, while the formation of a democracy was a bold and dynamic move, and these men were careful about instituting law and order from a biblically moral perspective, there is nothing about the foundation of America that is exclusively Christian. Godly, maybe. Virtuous, sure. Honorable, absolutely. But “Christian?” Go back to number four and consider again what it really means to be a Christian, and then decide if the Declaration of Independence or the U.S. Constitution delves anywhere close to the depth of the Epistle to the Romans or the Gospel of John. Sure, the documents may mention God (invoking his name as “Creator” or as “Divine Providence”), but Christianity is about much more than a simple belief in a Creator. In truth, while our founding fathers should be admired for their extraordinary leadership in forming a new nation, assuming the United States of America is a Christian nation is groundless, and, ultimately, pointless.

To a lot of Christians, this may seem like a shocking statement. After all, there is a large contingent of churchgoers who are convinced that the separation of church and state is a thing to lament rather than to celebrate. In truth, we have a Baptist minister to thank for that, not to mention a handful of other ministers and pastors who ensured our founding fathers made the right calls when it came to religious liberty.

It always strikes me as odd that some of the people who whine about how crucial it is for America to return to its Christian heritage are quite often the same people who can’t even get along with the Lutherans or the Methodists just down the road.

This is all your fault, Reverend Leland!

A Final Word

So, how should we conceive Christianity? If these seven thoughts are wrong, what’s the right way? Is there even a right way?

I could begin to answer these questions. After all, I have laid down my life in submission to answering them. However, in the interest of bringing an end to what is already a very long post, I’ll just make a simple plea for now.

If there is one thing that I have learned about Christianity – and I mean true Christianity – it’s that it is not for the faint of heart. There are a lot of people who have walked away from the Church or have given up on the whole Christian “thing” because of one or more of the misconceptions I have mentioned, as well as a great number of other misunderstandings I have failed to mention. The tendency in our modern society is to expect results as quickly as possible – to understand how something works enough to be able to control it and to put it to work for ourselves. We do this with iPhones, televisions, the Internet, our cars, even our paychecks. We have a bad habit of doing this with our beliefs, too. If we don’t see the results we expect, we reject what we believe in favor of an upgrade, or a different model. Some of us become so frustrated that we throw the whole system in the garbage, assuming that because we don’t understand everything about it, it must be defective.

All this to say, don’t let the bad habits of our modern society keep you from this beautiful mystery, this saga of runaways limping their way back home.

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7 Misconceptions about Christianity – Part One

According to some of the most recent polling data, somewhere between 70-80% of Americans identify themselves as “Christian.” According to the recent census, that’s roughly 220,000,000 people. Many of these polls break down the figures in smaller percentages under categories like “professing,” “active,” and “attend church occasionally,” as well as by various denominations and sub-groups. However, despite the obligatory clarifications, I find it hard to believe that if I bump into ten people on the street (I should probably stop playing Angry Birds while walking), at least seven of those people would, if asked, identify themselves as Christians.

"Watch where you're going, %&$*! Oh, and peace be with you."

This begs the question, do all 219,999,999 of my brothers and sisters in Christ really understand what Christianity is all about? After all, having worked in churches for over ten years, I’ve met some people who don’t always seem to have the best grasp on what claiming to be a Christian really means. Meanwhile, there are a lot of folks not belonging to that 220 million figure that have their own ideas about what Christians believe.

Martin Luther nailed ninety-five clarifications to the door of the church in Wittenburg, Germany. Right now, I’ve come up with what I feel are seven pervading misconceptions, the first three of which are contained in this post. Thus, what follows here is by no means an exhaustive list. But, hey, you’ve got to start somewhere, right? I think ol’ Martin would be proud.

#1 – Christianity Isn’t A Religion

This is the first, and most significant, misconception carried around today. Most of the time, the ones that have it wrong are the people who actually profess to be Christians. The problem is that the word “religion” carries a certain stigma these days. In the modernized West, a “religious” person is often considered old-fashioned, or backwards, or regressive. The word “religious” conjures up vague images of mysticism or superstition, or, at the very least, a close-minded or obstinate person. The connotative reality of religion is that it is obsolete. This is all the more reason why Christians (as well as many other people who subscribe to a particular system of faith) hesitate to label their specific belief as a religion. They’ll call themselves “spiritual” or people “of faith,” but it takes a lot of prying for many of them to agree that they subscribe to a specific “religion.” And, if they do, they are quick to clarify that it isn’t a religion like all those other ones that aren’t true and are therefore plain old religions for religions’ sake.

And it shows!

The problem with this is simple. Even if we can agree that Jesus never intended to start a religion (in actuality, he claimed to be the fulfillment of one), the simple fact of the matter is that Christianity is a religion. It is the belief in and worship of a supernatural power, specifically that of a personal creator – God. It has tenets and doctrines. It is driven by particular theological viewpoints and contains specific rites and observances. Some Christians can try to sugarcoat all this as much as possible, but there’s no getting around the obvious. Consider this: While living in San Francisco, I decide to buy an SUV. To avoid the stigma and the requisite criticism, I swear up and down that it isn’t really an SUV, but merely a convenient transportation device I use to get to and from Oakland. “But it’s an SUV,” you tell me. “No, no,” I say, “It’s really more of a Smart Car, or, if anything, it’s a Sedan.” “But,” you say, “it has ‘Expedition’ written on the side, it seats nine people, and you average only eleven miles per gallon.” “That doesn’t prove anything,” I say, and then I proceed to invite you to visit the dealership with me because, hey, everybody should have one of these. You might suspect I was losing my mind. How much more if I refused to acknowledge the simple, historical reality of the very thing upon which I posture my entire life?

It’s high time Christians stop trying to paint over the religion-y parts of their faith just so they can avoid a stigma that is founded on its own misconceptions, such as…

#2 – Christianity was Established by Powerful, Chauvinistic Men Only to Further Their Prejudices

You have probably heard this criticism, whether you consider yourself a Christian, a spiritual person, or an atheist. On the surface, there seems to be some evidence for this assertion. For one thing, every one of Jesus’ twelve disciples were men. Not only that, but the Bible instructs women to submit to their husbands, that they should hold no authority over men, and (if you read closely) that they not even speak during worship!

SINNER!

To top it all off, Christianity was born during a time and in a culture that embraced patriarchy both in the family and in government. Men ran the show at home, and they ran the show at work. The stigma of Christianity being backwards or regressive must be true, and, as such, any self-respecting person, male or female, should shake off its oppressive chains and start living in the twenty-first century.

Once again, this criticism is without compelling merit. While it is true that Christianity was born within a patriarchal – and, some might label, chauvinistic – society, time and again history reveals how little it conformed to the standards of the day. While the twelve disciples were men, they were by no means seasoned leaders, and they were by no means alone. In fact, according to the gospels, the first person entrusted to tell people that Jesus had risen from the dead (the first missionary, as it were) was a woman – Mary Magdalene – who, at one time, had been demon-possessed, but had since become a devoted follower of Jesus, emphasis on the “devoted follower” part.

Later, Dan Brown would remind us she was also Jesus' refugee wife with a penchant for scavenger hunts who liked to hide DNA evidence in France.

As to the instructions for women to submit and to hold no authority over men, never was historical context more important. The most significant passage suggesting this is found in the letter to the Ephesians, a society that contained a very influential cult of goddess-worship – Artemis Ephesia - the temple of which was considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, the celebration of which included rampant promiscuity and debauchery, and the worship of which could sometimes go as far as objectifying women as divine beings and lead to the castration of some male worshippers.

"Whoa! Is this cult still around? Count me in!"

Because the early Christian communities often had an issue of listening to false teachers or merging their beliefs with the local hot deity of the day, the writer of Ephesians sets a standard of leadership that would prevent the infiltration of goddess-worship ideas within the congregation. Perhaps the instruction sounds extreme, but the last thing you need are your women refusing to listen to their pastors and your men taking literally Jesus’ figurative statement that “some have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of God.”

Unfortunately, St. Origen didn't always grasp the concept of figurative language.

Does this mean the teaching that women should submit is not meant to be heeded in the church today? That’s not the point. Not only is that teaching used as an extended metaphor of Jesus Christ’s relationship with the Church, but context reveals that this has nothing to do with one gender holding the power. Rather, a good marriage is built on mutual respect and submission to one another in love. Of course, there are denominations today who still refuse to ordain women, and some that even follow Ephesians to the letter. This is their prerogative, but the structure of a local church’s authority was never the focal point of Christianity’s message.

So, what is that message?

#3 – Christianity is Chiefly Concerned with Getting People into Heaven

If there is one abiding belief that Christianity, more than any other religion, is most responsible for influencing the greater public with, it is the existence of a place called heaven. Cartoonish, groundless portrayals of heaven as some temporal realm in clouds aside, there are plenty of people who do not profess to be Christians but who still believe in the prospect of heaven. Many of these people are willing to state that there is a God, and he/she is in heaven, and after we die we get to go and live there, too. As far as the conditions for “getting in” to heaven, this normally boils down to a measure of moral fortitude and the cumulative number of good deeds outweighing bad.

"In your case, Robin, I fear there may be quite a lot of paperwork involved."

The thing is, Jesus was never all that concerned with the details of heaven, where it is or what it looks like. He spent his time talking about righteous living in the here and now, and telling story after story about what it looks like when the kingdom of God (often considered synonymous with “heaven”) is established in our world. At one point in the gospels, his disciples ask him to teach them how to pray the way God would want them to, and he imparts to them what we know as the Lord’s Prayer. Consider the first few lines: “Our Father in heaven, you are holy and we honor you. We want your kingdom to come and for your will to be done on earth as it is in heaven…” When asked how to pray to God, Jesus opens with a call for God to bring heaven to earth. At another time, when some of the religious heavyweights were asking him when exactly they could expect this kingdom of God to come, he replied, “It doesn’t come in a way that you can observe and predict it, nor can anyone say, ‘Oh, there it is,’ or ‘Hey, here it is,’ because the kingdom of God is found within you.”

It may seem a bit Zen-like, but the main point to understand is that while salvation in Christ – sometimes referred to as justification by faith – is at the heart of the Christian message, it was never meant to be a stamp on your hand so you can pass by heaven’s bouncer without getting harassed or thrown into a dumpster around back.

Interestingly, "gehenna," the word often used to refer to hell, was Jerusalem's garbage dump.

Instead, it was meant as a complete life change. Call it a reversal, call it a paradigm shift, call it a clean slate – Christianity is concerned with the way we live our lives right now. Sure, there is a lot of talk in churches about “eternity” and “heaven,” but just like the churches that pay too much attention to the gender of their leaders, some Christians spend too much time thinking about “heaven by and by.” It goes beyond a comforting hope to a kind of obsessive escapism. Still, though, assuming such a notion is what being a Christian is all about is a tragic misconception that can cause you to miss out on the grander and much more wondrous reality of this religion we call Christianity.

I’ve only scratched the surface, but I think this is enough for now. We’ll continue with the next four next week…

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Living with Mystery

A relevant graphic, or the guy who eventually became The Riddler?

It is not a convenient thing to live with questions. The modern culture in which we live does not cotton to mystery in place of cold, hard facts; it does not hold an appreciation for uncertainty. We want answers, definitions, explanations that connect A to Z. It is usually not very popular to connect A to V and state that the rest of the path may remain unknown. If physical effort in a person’s life is composed of growing stronger and more capable of handling the tasks set before him, then his mental effort is geared toward furthering an overall understanding of the world in which he lives and the purposes for which he strives within it. This is not unique to a certain culture – it is a fundamental aspect of humanity. Given a choice, we would much rather know than wonder.

This is why to live as a Christian is, essentially, counter-cultural. At the very heart of the life of a Christian and the mission of the Church is that sometimes-inspiring-but-often-annoying word that serves as the axis upon which everything turns: faith. If you grew up going to church, or found yourself attending a youth group at some point during your adolescence, or have simply visited a local congregation from time to time, you’ll hear this word again and again. Sometimes there will be someone, a teacher or a preacher or a fellow worshipper, who will feel confidant enough to define it for you. Even the writers of the Scriptures attempt to define it, one of the more famous being the first verse of the eleventh chapter of the Book of Hebrews: “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” When I was in high school, one of my Sunday School teachers told me that the Greek word for “hope” means “certainty.” He translated the verse, “Now faith is being certain of what you are certain is going to happen, and certain about what you don’t know.” It always sounded ridiculous to me, but for a time, I believed it. Hope, and as an extension, faith itself, meant certainty. There was no question, no mystery. As a Christian, what I believed became cold, hard fact.

It didn’t take long for this assertion to fail me. Deep down, I knew there was no way to prove what I believed and exactly how I was supposed to go about this life of faith. If I couldn’t prove it, then I could never be certain. Thus, faith melted back into mystery. I came to realize that the little definition verse out of the Book of Hebrews was not meant to insist on certainty, but to instill confidence in the midst of uncertainty. That was the rub – the real definition. Confidence within mystery.

On the road of life, there are questions and there are answers...

Christians may not realize it, but acceptance of mystery and teachings on what authentic faith looks like have been waning in the Church. A lot of congregations may pay lip service to the reality that the Christian life cannot be outlined all the way from A to Z, but they operate as if it can. And a lot of folks are not comfortable with questions. Many believe that faith is all about certainty, and if you are struggling with understanding or accepting some characteristic of God or some doctrine of the Church, you have a lack of faith. Your faith is weak. Why is this? Is it not because of our human nature, that admitting we don’t know something, or we don’t (yet) understand something is not a comfortable thing to do?

Behold the face of evil (whose vision has apparently been corrected).

Case in point: One of the big topics of conversation within the Western Church over the past few months has been Rob Bell’s newest book, Love Wins. Before this book even hit shelves, bloggers lit the match of controversy by claiming that Pastor Bell was a universalist – that he believes there is no hell, or at least that, when all is said and done, no one will end up there. Many believed, before even reading it, that his new book provided proof of this. There are a lot of folks in the Church who have avoided reading the book because they assume the agenda is to reason away the existence of hell. Some have even gone so far to say that they are not surprised in this alleged revelation about Bell; his earlier books are full of questions regarding some of the basic tenets of the Christian faith. For crying out loud, the subtitle of his first book was “Repainting the Christian Faith”! Obviously, this guy is on a path to heresy, watering down the Gospel message with his reimagined metaphors and questions.

I’m reading Love Wins right now. So far, I’m a fan. Rob Bell isn’t erasing hell any more than he is redefining heaven (both single chapters in a work that is focused on much larger concepts). What he is doing is asking questions. He’s leaving room for wonder. He’s concerning himself with the nature of faith itself – that while we can’t always know exactly how things are going to work out, we don’t have to cover up this reality. Instead, we can do our best to examine what we do know, and focus our lives toward the truth in which we hope for. In other words, Bell’s book is upholding the belief that questioning and re-examining is a healthy discipline, while pretending as if everything about the Christian life is clear and practical and in accordance with our culture is detrimental and only succeeds in producing Christians who may appear relevant but actually possess no real foundation to their professed beliefs.

It is important to remember, also, that while Christians must learn to live with a sense of mystery – an understanding that not all questions can be answered – we must also not fail to engage these questions. Just because a question cannot be fully, definitively answered does not mean we don’t attempt to answer it. Living with mystery does not mean brushing off all the difficult ideas because we suspect we will never arrive at a full understanding. This attitude exists not in people who embrace mystery, but people who are afraid of it. It comes from people who want all uncertainty brought to light, and if they encounter something that seems unsolvable, they are quick to say, “Oh well, I guess it’s just a mystery. We’ll understand it when we get to heaven.” This doesn’t mean they have examined the idea and come to a point of true acceptance; this means they want to forget it, erase it from their life.

What if Moses had pulled that one?

It all boils down to fear. Too many Christian live in fear, and the thing we fear most is uncertainty. Uncertainty means doubt. It means a lack of answers. At times, it means a wringing of the hands. It means questions and debate. It means disagreement. It means endless patience. It means, ultimately, that our comfort is not God’s number one priority. Dr. Roger Olson calls the people who have learned to live confidently amidst the questions, “reflective Christians.” In his book Questions to All Your Answers, he writes:

Reflective Christianity is culture-shaping Christianity. It encounters the world and presents the Christian message as a viable competitor against all the other worldviews and philosophies and spiritualities in the marketplace of ideas. It is unafraid of the hard task of critically thinking through and sometimes against what is already believed and taught and making it intelligible to honest seekers after truth. It is also self-critical Christianity that does not make idols out of traditional beliefs or personal feelings or favorite styles of worship but subjects them all to the test of truth and lets the chips fall where they may.

I suspect that a lot of non-Christians who have, at some point in their lives, rejected the Church because of what they felt was close-mindedness, or overly dogmatic sermonizing, or a disconnect from logic and reason, may be rejecting a skewed, self-centered version of the life of faith.

The real life of faith is much roomier than a lot of people think, or are comfortable believing. It embraces seekers after the Truth, is patient with their questions, respectful of their doubts and confidently dedicated to encouraging more and more reflection. It is the only way we will cultivate an authentic awareness of all the glory and wonder that exists between A and B, and B and C, and C and D, and so on all the way to Kingdom come.

by

What’s the Deal with Atheism?

*Please note, what follows is not intended to offend any of my readers, especially those who claim to be atheists. I’m just trying to figure some things out, and I welcome any feedback…

Maybe it’s me. Maybe it’s just a personal quirk that I’m noticing so many stories about atheists engaging today’s culture. In the last twenty-four hours, I’ve run across two stories (this one and this one, both from CNN’s “Belief Blog”) that have been the most recent in what seems a continual flow of news stories in which atheism is either being attacked, or, more often, atheists are doing the attacking. It strikes me as a little odd, like when two different summer blockbusters about meteors on a collision course for Earth come out within a month of each other. I don’t know. Maybe it’s me.

On the plus side, we have an explanation for how light gets refracted.

Honestly, even as an ordained minister, I really don’t have a clear idea what to do with atheism when I encounter it. If I find myself in conversation with an atheist or someone expressing a bitterly nihilistic, or even just an agnostic, idea, I am overcome by two conflicting emotions: intimidation and pity. Intimidation because I feel immediately as if I have to be on my guard, even if this person has no interest whatsoever in my two cents on the issue, or my reasons for claiming faith in a Higher Power. Pity because, well, not to belittle the person, but a life intentionally squelched of belief strikes me as an extremely tragic way to live.

Then again, a committed atheist might say the same about me. That what I have made the center of my life is nothing more than a delusion shared by millions of other people who are either too scared or too ignorant to wise up and accept reality. Reality. Realism. What is real, true, based in fact. Philosophically speaking, realism is the doctrine that universals or abstract concepts have an objective and absolute existence. In other words, if something is to be believed or claimed as true, it must first be proven to exist. No question as to origin or inception – testable, certifiable, observable existence. Because I cannot – and will not – make that claim about God or about the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, it is understandable that I might seem like the person with the sad life.

Well, when you put it THAT way, you make me sound like crazy ol' Tom Cruise...

Nevertheless, I like to consider myself a realist. I know that in certain ways, I am a pragmatist. When it comes to literature, I enjoy late nineteenth century to the present more than I enjoy what comes before, and I know this is because Realism brought about a greater attention to the verisimilitude – the true-ness – of the narratives, which I enjoy. I do not loathe or dismiss humanity in all its grit and earthiness. I welcome laymen’s terms.

However, I like these things not only because of how real they feel, but also because of how enthralled I am at the act of consecration. I like seeing things made holy. Set apart. Touched by divinity. I like it when something becomes more than the sum of its parts. I celebrate when 2 + 2 equals 4, but even more than this triumph of logic and fact, I embrace all the significance and possibility that comes with 4. On the other hand, when your god is Reason, your church is Realism, and your liturgy is Logic, you rob existence of its significance and of its meaning whether you mean to or not. If a man can be nothing more than the sum of his parts, then he does not have the option of living his life so that it leaves a legacy. Rather, the only thing it will leave is a formula.

From what I read, and from the arguments I listen to, it seems that many people claim atheism as a reaction to the prejudices and injustices they see in religion. They observe the hypocrisy and duplicity and sanctimony and empty talk that comes out of so many people professing faith, not to mention the penchant for violence, greed and outlandish vindictiveness from extreme fundamentalist Muslims (and, to a lesser extent, extreme fundamentalist Christians), and they are quick to shirk any ideology or behavior that shares a connection with these institutions. Some of these people will confidently claim that “religion will destroy this world” long before any meteor finds its way into our atmosphere.

Zing! Zing! and Zing!

Certainly, I understand this side of the argument. Still, though, I find it wanting. I’ve mentioned before that rejecting religious belief because of the way some – and I stress, some - of its subscribers conduct themselves and their groups is like razing every field of crops in the South because of the methods plantation owners once used to tend them. No one in their right mind would blame the cotton fields for slavery, but a lot of atheists and agnostics are perfectly willing to reject the idea of religious faith because they see corruption in some of its constituents. Put it another way: I have a post-surgical wound on my left foot that is not healing properly. There are two ways I can handle this. I can have skin graft surgery, or I can have my foot amputated just above the ankle. Atheists who reject faith because of a person’s inability to live up to it perfectly are essentially grabbing hold of the bone saw. Calling this system an overreaction is an understatement.

I’ll most likely draw some fire for this article from anyone who believes in subscribes to atheism. However, my intention is not to insult, but to attempt to dissect the reason why a person would choose to reject all manner of belief in God, in holiness, in the sacred. Some who disagree with me might claim that what atheists are really rejecting is theism (by definition, this is what the word “atheism” means). They might argue that an atheist is more than welcome to “believe” in things – in justice and goodness and honesty and love and all manner of other virtues. The problem is, without a Higher Power – a “Universe Speaker” if you will – the only way to explain how these virtues have come into existence is by pointing to the fickle inclination of humans; we’ve already established how fleeting and undependable such virtues can be in a world full of people also capable of arrogance, laziness, deceit, greed, wrath and all manner of corruption. It doesn’t make sense to me how the former qualities would still be around after so long if there did not exist an inciter and protector of them – say, a sovereign and righteous God. What grounds is there for anything to be more than the sum of its parts? How can a man be more than a walking and talking scale of possible good vs. occasional evil? I’m just trying to be realistic here.

*sigh* ... and zing.

Maybe it’s just me, but these are questions I have.